FontStruct | FontStruction Feed: Soma

Comment from Magic Sam

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Very nice concept. Like it!

Comment from Frodo7

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Yet another fine example that the idea is all around us. It looks beautiful. Flawless. Actually, I expected to see something like this from you after the release of tesselation and molecular complex series. One can not not see the third dimension in them. Now I've learned about the Soma cube (and its connection to lectures on quantum mechanics), this font looks even more attractive. I couldn't help, but took the mathematical description of soma pieces a bit further. We can describe your letters as polycubes of orders 8-27 (e.g. I = dodeca cube; J = duodeca cube; G = pentadeca cube; E = hexadeca cube, etc.). Add to that the description of left/right screw, branching, bending, chirality, and presto you defined your letters the way even a blind computer can visualize them. Any "colour" version in your font workshop?

Comment from Frodo7

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Correction: I = octa cube

Comment from intaglio

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

You've outdone yourself, f.k. What I particularly like -- no shading! No that I'm agin it, far from it. But I love the way the dimensional effect is achieved just by messing with the conventions, and the fact the glyph shapes themselves are an extension of what you've been playing with for a long time now. Perfect.

Comment from geneus1

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Okay, I'm going to start calling you Funk King Midas because everything you touch turns to fonts! Really nice execution on this one. Greatness, cubed.

Comment from oyrus

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

It's like a set of recomposed rubik cubes.

Comment from funk_king

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

thanks crew for your comments and support. @frodo7 - whew man, that's some deep stuff there. you bring another um, dimension to commentary. you are a true renaissance man. sorry no color version. @ tag - yes, i'm an evolutionist for sure. it seems i start something and like a pit bull, can't quite release it until, well until, oh forget it :) @genenus1 - haha fkm. now i need to go reserve some new email addresses and domain names :) @ oyrus - well i'm not certain, but i think soma was invented first. but of course rubik is what everyone knows. and when i was searching for the soma cube before i found it, i mainly got results showing rubik. but you're right :)

Comment from gferreira_admin

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Congratulations! FontStruct Staff have deemed your FontStruction worthy of special mention. “soma” is now a Top Pick.

Comment from gferreira_admin

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

A wonderful synthesis of all the work you have put into the Molecular series.

Comment from djnippa

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

The Puzzle style fonts seem to be ruling the roost at the moment. Well done.

Comment from SquarePeg

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Beautiful work, funk king. And, now I know what a soma cube is. :-)

Comment from funk_king

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

thanks fs staff and djnippa and squarepeg :) @squarepeg - as i remember the soma cube can be lots of fun and much less frustrating than rubik :)

Comment from afrojet

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Digging this FK. Like Oyrus, I'm loving the rubik's cube vibe.

Comment from funk_king

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

thanks afrojet for the sample. sweet :)

Comment from Frodo7

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Great sample!

Comment from p2pnut

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Nice one.

Comment from darkseeid

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Nice font tribute to the best "MC" of geometry....,)

Comment from funk_king

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

thanks darkseeid :)

Comment from peace818

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Awesome !!

Comment from c.h.a

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

very nice !

Comment from will.i.ૐ

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Hey, just spotted Soma in the wild. It’s being used as the logotype for an Asian cinema review site’s masthead. Check it out at iSugoi. Sugoi desu yo ne! : )

Comment from funk_king

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

since it is a non-profit site, i only asked for attribution. now Soma is mentioned on the About page. thanks, will.

Comment from funk_king

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Comment from djnippa

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Just seen this on Shutterstock.

Comment from funk_king

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

thanks, dj. do you still have the link to this image?

Comment from djnippa

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

http://www.shutterstock.com/pic.mhtml?id=43153555

Comment from ExtremeFontMaker

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

:O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O :O v that is so awesome! Mine are crap compared to yours!

Comment from ExtremeFontMaker

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Comment from ExtremeFontMaker

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

And did you put it on dafont? Cos that is how I wanted to join FontStruct.

Comment from Goatmeal

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

@Funk_King: Font siting: The current issue of PC Gamer uses the SOMA font in an article about the basics of Minecraft. However, there is an odd vertical line across the top surface of the block directly below the "T" cross bar. A smaller version of the SOMA "MINECRAFT" graphic also starts the each top left page so as to unify the gaming tips. PC GAMER (US Edition) Issue # 210 February 2011 Minecraft article Pgs 56-63 Here is a scan of the first two pages:

Comment from funk_king

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

thank you very much, goatmeal. a very pleasant, but unsettling surprise indeed. how much better it would have been to have been contacted and discussed terms including some type of attribution in the magazine. i mean, if you care enough about using this particular font for this particular article in print, then blah blah blah. i guess not. i'll try to contact them and take it from there. but this should be encouraging to us all despite the license/legal aspect. it's always good to see another example of a fontstruction perhaps becoming mainstream. my downloads on dafont.com for Soma are approaching 90,000, yet the commercial version on myfonts.com :( like they say, why pay when you can get it for free? we'll see how this situation turns out. but thanks again. i doubt i would have been aware of this if not for you being a fellow fontstructor and true renaissance man of gaming.

Comment from djnippa

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Great find. I'd love to know how you get on. I'm not too sure what your legal standing would be. I feel we should all be paid in full if a font is used without permission. If they bought it off MyFonts then it's fair enough. How are sales going by the way?

Comment from funk_king

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

actually, i have already heard back from one of their reps. he downloaded it from dafont and the license is creative commons attribution no derivatives, instead of non-commercial - my mistake :( so i think technically they get a pass on this one. he was apologetic about not including any attribution per the license, so i suppose i could be an arse about it and pursue legal recourse on that point, although he did say he would include attribution in the next issue. so i'll think about it. maybe ask for a copy of the rag for my portfolio :)

Comment from Goatmeal

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

I'd send you my copy, but I had to disassemble it to scan it... Happy to help, FK. Cheers!

Comment from neurone error

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

@Funk King : i know the free world is a very important thing for you, but maybe now that you've decided to sell some of your works, at least for them you should keep off all available free versions. I don't think to let a more restricted set available is a good idea, Or you sell or you sell not! I personally bought fonts just to use 3 or 4 glyphs, and i was happy for that i did not think to have lost my money. Of course it's cool to find all these extraordinary fonts for free, and we'll never thank the font designers enough for that, there are not so many fields left in society today where we can obtain so many quality products for free. But there's no shame to expect some bucks from our hard work. Sometimes i feel my dear Funk King, that you feel a bit guilty to sell your work, that's maybe the reason that with so much good material in your productions you developped and put so few in the commercial world.I think you must try and assume a bit more your entry in the commercial fonts world, and after all, "they" had time, about 2 years for some of your designs, to find them everywhere for free, you will not be the first to have retired works from Dafont when they went "commercial"...

Comment from funk_king

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

thanks for the moral support, neurone. i guess i haven't made the time to really manage my fonts properly. in a way, i am very lazy once i have made the font and there is so much more to having a (successful commercial) foundry than just creating fonts. but for now i am content and will probably continue with the current model. but once we have the 'all rights reserved' option to only display our fonts and not allow downloads, watch out! :)

Comment from djnippa

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

You do tons of great stuff, that is very sell-able, okay so you might not sell many, but at least you're selling. Rather than giving it away. People will take anything if it's FREE, even if it's substandard. I'm a firm believer you sell to people you don't know, you give to friends and family. There's much more satisfaction selling just 1 item then 10,000 FREE downloads in my book. I hope we do get the "NOT DOWNLOADABLE" option soon, or $5 - $10 buy option. I may be in the minority, but I'd certainly buy a lot of fonts on here.

Comment from funk_king

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

thanks, dj. i don't know - i would agree there is nothing like getting paid for our hard work, but there is a different satisfaction i get when someone downloads my work. and i might also argue the point about people will take anything for free - if that were completely true then i would have even more downloads of my less popular fonts, no? but the point is moot and i know what you're saying. although i might buy some fonts on here, even greater in my mind - i would much rather split whatever proceeds my fonts would generate with fontstruct than another website in the same business. i actually would be happy (well...ok, yeah, happy :) to give it to them knowing that if it weren't for fontstruct the font wouldn't even exist and be for sale.

Comment from djnippa

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

If there are hundreds of FREE downloads available then yes, people are a little more selective, but only a little. My Original "GET PAID FOR FONTSTRUCTS" suggestion (which I made way back when), was that if you sell a font for $5, then you would take $4-$4.50 and Fontstruct would take $0.50-$1 (10 or 20%). That way it would be an incentive for Rob to introduce it, and also help maintain and improve the site, so people could produce better work. We constantly see Fontstructs being abused in many ways, on various sites, in magazines, and even TV ads! These are but a tiny minority of the ones which are actually spotted by other Fonstructors. The tip of the iceberg. The fact that people get into a routine of downloading FREE fonts, makes them unwilling to PAY for decent fonts, and this causes a massive downshift of the whole system. A bit like the music industry is going through at the moment. It has to stop. We are being exploited. Basic rule of Business - you work - you get paid. On the other hand, when you work for Fun, you don't get paid...... until you wake up and think - "hang on everyone's benefiting from my hard work", everyone except you that is!! Even though it's a hobby for you, creativity is highly paid for and sought after in the real world, it's just that creative people are often not very forthright, or business minded in asking for payment, as they derive immense pleasure from their hobby, and don't actually see it as work. Non-creative people often exploit this fact. We have to stop this. Being creative is a rare commodity that needs to pay the rent, just like everybody else does.

Comment from Adien Gunarta

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

you can get money for these

Comment from aphoria

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

I love djnippa's idea for a "get paid for fontstructs" option. Perhaps a more easily achieved improvement would be the "No Download" option. This would allow you to make a font public and display samples without allowing downloads.

Comment from thalamic

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

I'd be willing to a much better job if there was a 'get paid' option. Alternatively, a 'no download' option would be welcome as well.

Comment from meek

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Apologies for joining this minimoot so late. I would definitely like to add a "no download" option. This is something which could well be tried out in the next month. I'd also like to offer FontStructors an option to sell versions of their designs on FontStruct itself - I think this would make a lot of sense, and there have been plans of this nature for a long time. - It “just” needs to be implemented :-) - It's a lot of work (to do it well) and will take some time. I'm committed to keeping FontStruct a free service with sharing and creativity rather than commerce in the foreground, but adding a marketplace aspect could be a good way to help pay for the continuing development of the site. Finally, a reminder to everyone that you can't change a license retrospectively. For example, if Joe Bloggs downloads your font under a license allowing commercial use on Monday, you can't change the license on FontStruct on Tuesday to prohibit commercial use and then stop Joe from using your font for free in his latest Hollywood blockbuster.

Comment from ianleeye

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

Your font should be on T-shirts!

Comment from Goatmeal

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

@funk_king -- I sent you a FontStruct message regarding Soma.

Comment from Pavlovili

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

nicely - nicely!